
The Coast on Canvas
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Long before television discovered the Orange County coast, its beauty was made known in the oils and watercolors of Southern California’s pioneering plein air artists. From roughly 1890 to 1930, painters like Edgar Payne and William Wendt captured the coast’s rocky coves and sunlit, splashing surf. Today these paintings are notable for not only their artistic (and monetary) value but also the way they inspired the preservation of portions of the coast.